


Eddie Kaspbrak Gets a Nipple Piercing

by annejumps



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Eddie Kaspbrak Lives, First Kiss, Friends to Lovers, Getting Together, M/M, Nipple Piercings, Piercings, Roommates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-12
Updated: 2020-09-12
Packaged: 2021-03-06 22:40:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,184
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26426518
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/annejumps/pseuds/annejumps
Summary: He likes things as they are right now. That said, there’s a restlessness under his skin, something nagging and itching at him like a new growth, like healing after a sunburn, or maybe how reptiles feel when they’ve shed a layer of scales and are growing more. Like the way the scar on his side pulled at him when it was healing, only different. Deeper.
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Comments: 6
Kudos: 187





	Eddie Kaspbrak Gets a Nipple Piercing

Although his stab wound from Pennywise wasn’t fatal, Eddie can’t help feeling like his life now—clown dead, memories restored, separated from Myra, resigned from his job in New York, living with Richie in Chicago—is some sort of resurrection, a second chance. It’s a little strange to feel, at forty, that his life is just beginning, but there it is. 

He’s living with Richie because he hadn’t had anywhere else to go after Myra said he should leave, and frankly, there was nowhere else he _wanted_ to go. He was lucky that Richie, after a long pause when Eddie had called him, said yes, of course Eddie could live with him, just when Eddie was starting to feel sheepish and ridiculous as he waited for Richie’s reply. Months later, he still can’t shake the feeling he’s kind of imposing, even though Richie has never said a word that would imply he doesn’t want Eddie here in his guest bedroom. Eddie hopes Richie doesn’t feel like he owes Eddie just because Eddie saved his life. 

They get along surprisingly well considering how often they were at each other’s throats as kids: dinners together, movie nights, going for coffee together, going to the store together. It’s nice, being around Richie like this, and they still bicker plenty in a way they’re comfortable with. He loves that Richie trusted him enough to nervously come out to him as gay the first night he was here, saying he didn’t want to keep that from Eddie but that he wasn’t sure he was ready to tell the other Losers, and definitely not ready to come out publicly.

And Eddie feels lucky just being able to have this, even if he has to fight the urge sometimes to, say, wrap his arms around Richie from behind when Richie’s standing at the kitchen counter making coffee and somehow looking small and lonely. Eddie’s sure he’s just imagining that, maybe projecting it—after all, often enough, Richie will go out for the night and come back in the morning, looking disheveled and distracted, maybe some love bites on his neck that Eddie keeps thinking about until they fade and he forgets, until the next time Richie stays somewhere else for the night. Eddie thinks it’s nice having a quiet apartment to himself on those nights, but he’s not entirely sure that’s true—he likes hearing Richie moving around, hearing his snoring from behind his bedroom door.

For his part, Eddie doesn’t go out. For one, it’s too soon—after Myra, after Derry, after everything—and for another, he doesn’t really feel the urge to be anywhere else or be with anyone else. Maybe soon, though. He’s just lately realizing and accepting that yes, okay, he’s not all that interested in women after all, and that what really does it for him is broad shoulders and chests and hairy legs and chiseled, stubbled jaws. On top of everything else, that’s a lot to process, and he thinks he just needs time before he’s ready to get on apps and go to clubs and whatever else he’s supposed to do. There’s time, probably. He’s only just now getting used to not feeling shitty about it when he gets hard in the shower or in bed and jerks off to the idea of another man touching his dick and vice versa. He feels a sense of obligation to not imagine that that man is Richie—it seems rude—but, well, it’s hard to help it when Richie is the man he sees most often, standing in the kitchen in a threadbare shirt and boxers, hands dwarfing his coffee mug. 

He likes things as they are right now. That said, there’s a restlessness under his skin, something nagging and itching at him like a new growth, like healing after a sunburn, or maybe how reptiles feel when they’ve shedded a layer of scales and are growing more. Like the way the scar on his side pulled at him when it was healing, only different. Deeper.

Not far from Richie’s apartment building is a piercing and tattoo shop, and they walk past it a lot. Eddie’s never been interested in tattoos, but he finds himself thinking about how much it hurts when metal pierces through your skin if you do it on purpose, if you pay for it and a professional does it and you heal it properly. Assuming you don’t get hep C, or tetanus or something. He was in the hospital after being stabbed in the side, he knows that hurts and he has the scars to prove it, but… what would this be like?

The old Eddie Kaspbrak, the former Edward Francis Kaspbrak, with no memories of Derry as well as the one that did remember everything before all that faded, would have made a list of all the reasons why getting a piercing would be stupid: waste of money, pain, hep C, infection, tedious aftercare. The new one can’t stop thinking about it. He doesn’t tell Richie, though. Richie would make fun of him, he’s sure. If Richie knew he might be— _is_ —gay, he’d make fun of him even more for being a forty-year-old gay man feeling his oats and doing silly things. 

One day he goes into the shop and asks what the cost and procedure is for a nipple piercing, wonders if the attendant hears the slight shake in his voice and sees the trembling in his hands. The shop seems clean and there’s music quietly playing as the artists work; there’s the persistent buzz of the tattooing machine. The cost is lower and the process less complicated than he’d assumed, and the attendant talks about it all so matter of factly that Eddie feels more confident when he’s ready to leave. Eddie takes a handout and puts it in his wallet so Richie won’t find it and make fun of him. 

_I’m going to do it_ , he thinks, rolling the words around in his mind: _I’m going to get my nipple pierced_. The thought gives him a rush of excitement and trepidation. When he looks at himself in the mirror in the morning after he showers, he no longer dwells on the jagged scar tissue stretching along his side—instead he stares at his nipple and imagines it pierced through with a curved metal barbell. It’ll be a little secret, just for him until he chooses to show someone. 

He pores over reviews of the shop nearby, calls to make an appointment, and stares at it in his calendar until the day arrives. He doesn’t say a word about it to Richie. When it’s time to go down to the shop, he tells Richie he’ll be back later; Richie looks a little puzzled, but he just nods and says, “Okay, man.”

The employees of the shop seem so calm and together that Eddie finds it reassuring. They do this all the time. He picks out a titanium barbell with a slight curve to it, reads every word of the papers he’s given before signing, and once he’s in the chair, he watches closely as the piercer, a man with a mohawk and stretched ears, his neck covered in tattoos, sterilizes the jewelry and cleans everything. Shirt off, he lies down as instructed (he doesn’t want to pass out), and takes deep breaths as his nipple is cleansed with a surgical cleanser, followed by an antiseptic. Eddie’s familiar with germ-killing substances, and he feels comfortable with what’s used. A mark is drawn on the area, his nipple is clamped—now _there’s_ a sensation—and, just as he’s thinking that this is all going very fast, the piercer tells him to take a deep breath. 

The needle goes in, the sharp shock of the pain rolls all through his body, and then the piercer puts in the barbell and holds gauze over his nipple to stop the bleeding. Then, he puts on a bandage.

It’s done, he did it, it’s over. It was quick, and now Eddie sits staring at the ceiling, feeling like he’s floating and trying to take deep breaths.

The piercer reminds him that it can take months for the nipple to heal, and tells him to use saline rather than rubbing alcohol or hydrogen peroxide. He says that there will be some bleeding, soreness, and discharge for a while, and also that it’s important not to mess with the jewelry. Eddie must look completely spaced out, because the piercer chuckles and says this is all on the handout and he has more information to give him to keep for reference. Eddie’s grateful. The adrenaline rush he’s feeling is even stronger than he expected after reading about it, and he can’t really concentrate. He can’t believe he fucking did it. Once everything at the shop is taken care of, he goes home in a daze. 

His nipple is definitely tender, and he’s pretty sure he won’t be able to completely hide from Richie the fact that it’s sore just from the bandage touching his shirt. He’s highly aware of it, and it might be like this for months, even a year. Richie will probably, at some point, notice that something’s up. Maybe not for a while, though, and Eddie doesn’t have to tell him the truth.

Maybe unsurprisingly, that night when they’re on the couch Richie definitely takes notice when Eddie accidentally brushes his nipple with his arm and inhales in a hiss of pain. “You okay there, man?” he asks, and yeah, maybe Richie’s been a little attuned to his discomfort since he was hospitalized for being wounded by an evil clown. 

“Fine,” Eddie says, wincing until the pain passes into a throbbing. He’s got to be careful. “It’s nothing.” He manages to more or less ignore it the rest of the evening. Thankfully, he doesn’t sleep on his stomach, and on his back he doesn’t jostle it much during the night.

In the morning, he ponders whether to go running. Well, he can’t just not run for a year. He has compression shirts; maybe those won’t hurt too much. If he puts some soft gauze over it, then the compression shirt to gently hold it in place, maybe it’ll be fine.

It more or less works. When he gets back, Richie, sleep-frazzled and half-awake, is making coffee, and Eddie tells him he’s going to shower, like usual. He uses a gentle tea-tree liquid soap to wash the piercing, whispering “ow ow ow” to himself the entire time, even though he’s careful. Most of the rest of the day, he’s only aware of the piercing on a low constant level; it’s not sore in the way that would indicate a brewing infection, but he knows it’s there. He doesn’t think Richie notices him trying not to rub his shirt over his nipple, but if Richie does, he doesn’t say anything. 

That night, Eddie realizes that Richie’s probably going to notice if he gets up and goes to the kitchen to make a saline solution. He decides he’s going to say he’s noticed a sore spot in his mouth and he’s rinsing with warm salt water, if Richie asks. He doesn’t, but he notices when Eddie gets up after the movie’s over and gets a glass of warm water, adding salt to it, and taking it to “his” bathroom. When Eddie says good night, he nods.

Eddie stands in front of the bathroom mirror shirtless, and stares at his piercing. It actually looks really good, although it’s swollen. Eddie can understand now that he spent a lot of time directing his energy and desire for control into going to the gym, and he knows that, as these things go, he’s in pretty good shape. Aesthetically, a piercing was a good choice. He’s been doing a pretty good job lately of not thinking about his mother, or about Myra, but now he can’t help wondering what they would say if they saw him like this, if they knew what he now knows about himself. At this point, though, he doesn’t really care what they’d think or say. It wouldn’t matter.

He realizes he’d better stop staring at himself and use the saline wash before it cools too much, and he holds the glass up to and over his nipple so it’s surrounded by the water for a while. He stays like that for (he times it with the little digital clock in the bathroom) three full minutes. That done, he very gently pats the area dry, wincing all the while in case he accidentally nudges it too hard.

Okay. That wasn’t so bad.

The next few nights are much the same, except that there’s one night where Richie stays out and comes back the next morning, groggy and with a kissed bruise under his ear. Richie sees it every evening when Eddie gets a glass of warm salt water, but he doesn’t say anything. 

After the movie’s over one evening and Eddie’s gotten his glass and said good night, as he’s standing in front of his bathroom mirror shirtless and holding the water up, without having turned the glass to cup it over his nipple yet, he hears Richie walking toward him, stride too long for Eddie to react in time and set down the glass or cover his chest. Richie stops in the doorway, starting to speak: “Hey—” and then stopping abruptly as he stares wide-eyed at Eddie’s chest, looking like he’s been socked in the jaw. “What the fuck is that?” he finally croaks.

“What do you want?” Eddie snaps, starting to turn away, not wanting to get shit from Richie, who reaches out suddenly to touch his arm and keep him in place. 

“Do you have a _nipple piercing_ , Eddie?” Richie asks, sounding completely astonished. “Did you get your _nipple pierced_?”

“What does it look like, asshole?” Eddie huffs, in defiant annoyance deciding he might as well let Richie look and get his fill for all the chucks he’s sure this is going to produce. Eddie will never hear the end of it. He turns to face him fully, setting down the glass, letting Richie stare. Richie’s blushing, standing there in his tight, faded, soft-looking shirt and his chili pepper boxers.

“Well, it looks like you got your nipple pierced, buddy,” he says slowly.

“Get it over with and make fun of me for it,” Eddie tells him crisply. “Yeah, yeah, I know—uptight forty-year-old gay man gets a nipple piercing.”

“Gay man?” Richie repeats slowly, blinking as he drags his gaze upward to meet Eddie’s, and Eddie feels his eyes widen in horror when he realizes what he’s just said. 

“Um—”

“Eddie—”

“I should have told you earlier, I’m sorry—”

“No, don’t be sorry, you—”

“—you were brave enough to tell me that first night, I should have—”

“—It’s fine, Eddie, seriously—”

“Rich, I—”

Richie scrubs a hand through his messy curls and slumps against the doorjamb. His gaze returns to Eddie’s nipple like it’s magnetized. “How does it feel?” Richie finally asks, face still pink. 

“Sore,” Eddie admits.

“How did it feel when—” Trailing off abruptly, Richie swallows like he thinks he’s said too much, been too curious. Richie thinking about what he says is practically a miracle. 

“Hurt,” Eddie sighs, “and then it felt really, really good. I felt like I was floating or something. I’m always aware of it now.”

“Can you—” Richie reaches out suddenly, fingers in a pinching motion, and Eddie jumps back slightly. “Can you touch it? Can you—”

“Not yet,” Eddie says. “Not supposed to mess with it. Unfortunately. Might be a year.” 

“Wow, okay.” Richie swallows again, brows leaping up his forehead. “Well, it looks… really good, man.” He clears his throat.

“Thank you,” Eddie says, and means it. He chose to do this, went through with it, and he knows he’s put in the work to make his body look good, too. He feels like he should be able to indulge himself a little, here in his second life. There’s a long pause as Richie keeps looking at it, at him.

“Well, good night,” Richie finally says, still looking unsettled. 

“What were you coming to ask me?” Eddie interjects, as Richie turns.

“Oh! Nothing really, man,” Richie says. “See ya tomorrow.”

“Yeah,” Eddie says, and returns to his saline soak. From where his room is, he can’t hear Richie too well, but he seems to get to bed later than he usually does. Eddie wonders if he’s horrified on some level by Eddie getting a piercing. Maybe it was too unexpected, too shocking. But the next day, if Richie’s grossed out or whatever he doesn’t say anything to that effect. He looks at Eddie’s chest maybe more the next few days than he used to, but that’s not too surprising. 

Richie goes out that Saturday night, and Eddie, not expecting him to be back until Sunday morning, is surprised to see him in the kitchen at three a.m. when he gets up to pee and drink some water. Judging from his expression and the way he freezes as he stands there leaning against the counter in just his boxers, Richie isn’t expecting to see or be seen either. “I, uh, got home a little while ago,” he starts. “Didn’t mean to wake you up.”

“You didn’t,” Eddie tells him. Eddie thinks about it, and realizes this is the first night Richie’s gone out since he saw Eddie’s piercing, not that that means anything.

“He kick you out?” Eddie asks, teasing a little, the first time he’s ever openly, verbally acknowledged that Richie goes out with men and spends the night. “Had enough of the Trashmouth, did he?” His tone is wry, but Eddie’s not really feeling casual or at ease with the thought of Richie being out with these strange men who don’t seem to see him regularly—Eddie doesn’t know because Richie doesn’t discuss it with him, but he doesn’t seem to be seeing the same guy—who see fit to leave their marks on him but who aren’t otherwise interested in him, who leave him looking small and lonely by himself in the kitchen. Small and lonely despite the fact that he’s in just his boxers and he’s got a big, broad, hairy chest and wide shoulders with a slight pudge to his stomach and Eddie doesn’t think he’s ever been as attracted to anyone as much as he’s attracted to Richie. 

Richie flushes and looks at the floor. “I actually left on my own. Didn’t feel like hanging around,” is all he says. His teeth worry his lower lip. Eddie thinks again about wrapping his arms around Richie, how good it must feel to hold and be held by his big, warm, solid body. So he steps forward, and wraps his arms around him. “Whoa, hey,” Richie says, although he automatically raises his arms and puts them around Eddie in turn, “you don’t have to feel bad for me, I don’t need a pity hug, and besides, your— your nipple,” he gets out. 

“It’s fine, just keep still—and it’s not a pity hug, asshole,” Eddie says, wrapping his arms more tightly around Richie while trying not to rub his chest against anything too much. He presses his face into the base of Richie’s neck, inhaling him, wondering if he can smell the other man on him, wanting to obliterate every molecule of his scent left on Richie’s skin and wipe away any marks he might have left. 

Richie’s gone very still, as instructed—he’s barely breathing. As much as Eddie wants to kiss his collarbone, his pulse, he wants the first time his lips really touch Richie to be on his mouth, and he shifts back to see that slightly dazed expression still on Richie’s face before he pulls him down by the back of his neck and gets on his tiptoes to kiss him. Richie seemingly takes a moment to realize what’s happening, and then pulls him closer, carefully, and kisses him back, which Eddie does everything he can to encourage by parting his lips and finding Richie’s tongue with his own. Richie turns them, then, to press Eddie back against the counter and lift him a little bit against it while apparently trying not to rub his piercing, their hips slotting together as Eddie gets more leverage to kiss him, sliding his tongue into Richie's mouth again as his hands roam over the broad bare expanse of his back. Richie makes a soft sound, hands framing Eddie’s hips. Pulling himself up, Eddie sits on the counter, legs either side of Richie’s hips, and blinks at him.

“Congratulations,” Eddie tells him. “You’re the first man I’ve ever kissed.”

Richie moans and kisses him again immediately. He shifts his hips against Eddie, restless, hard now in his boxers; Eddie’s hard now too. Eddie kisses him thoroughly, wanting to rid him of any lingering taste from any other man who might have kissed him tonight. Usually, the thought of all this possible saliva mixing would have disgusted him—and maybe other bodily fluids, too, so maybe he’s lost his mind a little, but he doesn’t care quite enough to stop. Tonight, he just wants to claim his territory. 

Richie, breathless, breaks the kiss to stammer, “What do you— Can I—” and Eddie nods. Richie works a hand into Eddie’s underwear, hand wrapping around his cock. Eddie gasps, shuddering at just that touch of Richie’s big hand and long fingers. He wriggles to get his underwear down his hips a little, letting Richie free him.

“You too,” he gets out, fingers fumbling between them to get Richie’s cock free of his fly—the first time he’s touched another man this way. Richie gets it, and wraps his fingers around both their erections, fingers brushing Eddie’s, their cocks rubbing together. Eddie kisses him through it, marveling at their shared breaths, gasps, inhalations, until Richie comes, trembling and slack-jawed, and Eddie follows soon after, shaking and clinging to Richie. He rests his forehead on Richie’s shoulder, breathing him in and feeling his chest heave. He wraps his legs loosely around Richie’s, just to do it. 

“Eds,” Richie sighs, apparently at a loss. Eddie kisses his temple. 

“If you promise not to fuck up my piercing,” he murmurs, “you can come sleep in my bed.”

“Mm,” Richie says, closing his eyes. “You sure you don’t want to come to mine?”

“Yes,” Eddie decides. He’s used to the mattress in his.

Richie sets him down on slightly shaky legs, and they tuck themselves back in; Richie goes quickly to change into clean boxers and he’s in Eddie’s bedroom just as soon as Eddie’s changed into clean ones, too. 

Before he gets into bed, before he kisses him again, Eddie puts his hands on his hips and says, “If we’re doing _this_ —and by _this_ I don’t mean just sleeping in my bed tonight—I don’t want you to be seeing other men.” Maybe it’s the done thing now to be casual, to be open. But Eddie doesn’t want to share. If Richie wants to be shared, best for them both to know that now.

“Done,” Richie says instantly. 

“Rich—” Eddie starts, doubtful that Richie might fully know what he’s saying, wanting him to be sure.

“I only—” Richie’s going pink again. He laces his fingers together at the back of his neck, and takes a deep breath. When he speaks, it’s so uncharacteristically quiet that Eddie has to step closer to hear him, and Richie almost shrinks away. “I… After you moved in, I only went looking for... other men because I... didn’t think you were on offer,” he finally says, and swallows, looking at the ceiling.

“Get the light,” Eddie tells him, “and get in bed.” Eddie burrows under the sheets, followed quickly by Richie. “Watch out, be careful,” Eddie reminds him as he arranges himself in front of Richie, who tentatively wraps an arm around his waist, tucking in behind him. “Don’t fuck up the piercing.” Richie’s so big and warm it’s hard to be too fussed at him; he hums in contrition, snuggling up against him while trying to be mindful of Eddie’s chest. “If this one goes well,” he adds, “I’ll get the other one done too, _fuck_ , Rich, it felt so good when it was finished,” and Richie groans softly.

“Thought we were going to sleep, Eds.”

“We are,” Eddie says firmly. “It’s three in the morning. Rest up, you’re spending the nights here for the foreseeable future and I plan to wear you out, so sleep while I let you.”

“Jesus,” Richie sighs, muffled. “What have I gotten myself into.”

“Oh, just you wait,” Eddie says, shifting back against him. “Just you fuckin’ wait.” Richie hums, and Eddie pulls his arm more tightly around him, making sure to keep it away from his nipple. As he starts to fall asleep, he can’t shake the feeling that he’s _finally_ getting everything to settle into place, where it’s all supposed to be.

**Author's Note:**

> Written in a hurry this morning and I've never gotten a body piercing so sorry for any inaccuracies, although I tried to get it right!


End file.
